Upon completion of this semester, I will have finished working through Wheelock with my Latin 101 class. I have absolutely no plans to put my study of Latin on hiatus during the summer months, and I figure it would be fun to supplement my reading with some Latin composition.

My question to you all is thus: What is the best Latin composition textbook for second-year students?

I know that most (if not all) of my options were written sometime in the early 20th century, but that doesn't bother me in the least. I also know that Textkit supplies North & Hillard's composition book--is this generally regarded as the best of its kind?

We use the Hillard and North in our department and it is a competent book. My tutor has supplemented the work with a general schema of his own composition. I also find "Latin Sentence and Idiom" by R. Colebourn very useful - it is almost identical to the North and Hillard in material but elaborates on the constructions to a greater extent than the other book which is somewhat sparse and makes a lot of assumptions about the student which are not necessarily applicable to 21st century students. If I run into something that neither my tutor's schema, nor the North and Hillard, nor the Colebourn can settle, I resort to Woodcock's "A New Latin Syntax". I snagged all copies of the abovementioned books off Amazon but if you try alibris or abebooks you may find cheap copies of the hardback editions.

Shop around at Amazon.com. I've run into some amazing bargains on that site. I once bought the latest editions of the full Liddell and Scott, The Oxford Latin Dictionary (the full version) and the Lewis and Short for just $300 postage and packing included. I also recommend getting Smith's English-Latin dictionary and Woodhouse's Greek-English dictionary. Expensive but worth it if you get bitten by the composition bug.

However, I really need to get hold of the following:

1) A dictionary of Mediaeval Latin
2) A Latin-Greek dictionary
3) A lexicon of contemporary words rendered into Latin. I need to look up stuff such as boycott, computer, ice-cream etc. I was told that the Vatican had issued such an updated lexicon. Anyone had a look at it? Is it worth it? Where can I get hold of it?

1) A dictionary of Mediaeval Latin2) A Latin-Greek dictionary3) A lexicon of contemporary words rendered into Latin. I need to look up stuff such as boycott, computer, ice-cream etc. I was told that the Vatican had issued such an updated lexicon. Anyone had a look at it? Is it worth it? Where can I get hold of it?

Also I'd be interested in finding a Latin Greek dictionary (but the other items in your shopping sound good as well ).
I was thinking of finding a good pdf and then printing the book using Lulu. All the dictionaries I found, both on Google Books and at the UCSD library, have illegible words here and there. The only exception is this Tomus Posterior (Greek-Latin).

It's no joke trying to translate "bulldozer" or "steroids" into Latin.

Also, if you, like me are struggling to translate "Jordan", "China" or "Tibet" into Latin, you may find the following useful:

CARLO EGGER, Lexicon nominum locorum, 1977, pp. 348 [codice 1254-6]

A friendly prelate promised to nab copies of the twain the next time he goes to Rome. If however, you don't have friends within the Pontifical corridors of power, you may have some trouble getting hold of these volumes since they are only published by the Vatican and the vatican web site seems to lack e-commerce facilities....

1) A dictionary of Mediaeval Latin2) A Latin-Greek dictionary3) A lexicon of contemporary words rendered into Latin. I need to look up stuff such as boycott, computer, ice-cream etc. I was told that the Vatican had issued such an updated lexicon. Anyone had a look at it? Is it worth it? Where can I get hold of it?

Also I'd be interested in finding a Latin Greek dictionary (but the other items in your shopping sound good as well ). I was thinking of finding a good pdf and then printing the book using Lulu. All the dictionaries I found, both on Google Books and at the UCSD library, have illegible words here and there. The only exception is this Tomus Posterior (Greek-Latin).

I've checked out Bradley's Arnold and I've ordered a copy, you can never have enough reference books anyway, however, though apparently more exhaustive than the North and Hillard, it's extra material is covered by the "Hillard and Botting"

You see, the North and Hillard complements are more basic book by "Hillard and Botting". Together, the material in these two books is pretty much identical to the Arnold's. However, I prefer to go with the Hillard books since the exercises are graded very well. That said, I find the Colebourn explains the syntax more expansively than the North and Hillard does so I refer to it frequently.

Well I've just made some purchases on amazon... I got Hillard & Botting's Elementary Latin Exercises, R. Colbourn's Latin Sentence and Idiom, and Bradley's Arnold Latin Prose Composition. I'm really excited about these books and I can't wait to get started with my composition projects. I still fully intend to get the Smith dictionary, it's just a matter of time.

And for the Greek enthusiasts, I also got N. Marinone's Complete Handbook of Greek Verbs. Apparently, according to one of my professors, this is "the best $5.00 you can spend." Despite the fact that this small Italian book was actually about $26.00, I'm really jazzed about it.

Well, I've just snapped up a copy of Arnold from Abebooks. Wish there were such a wealth of composition books for Greek too... Let me know how you get on with your composition. I'm always willing to share tips and read over stuff to give feedback. Sometimes, we newbies, who don't reach the Ciceronian heights the dragons in our departments demand, need every bit of help and encouragement we can get.

First of all, that movie clip was hilarious. I bet the entire movie is just as funny, I'll have to check it out. I love those Monty Python guys.

It's going to be hard for me to hold off on the composition stuff until summer. I just went to an old used book store and got a huge book of children's fairy tales. I also got a book about the tales of Robin Hood if I was feeling daring. Once my composition books get here, it'll be even more hard to resist.

Thanks for the offer of assistance--I'll certainly take you up on that. I'm sure I'll be needing some help. You also mentioned earlier that you'd post something on your website. If my stuff passes the test, I think that'd be really cool